Codexis vs OriginOil: Who's the Best?

Background: This is a Sweet Sixteen (third round), Western  Regional match-up between #2 seed Codexis and #11 seed OriginOil, in the 2011 Transformative Technologies tourney, from Biofuels Digest.

Voting: Open to all Biofuels Digest subscribers. Voting links are in the Biofuels Digest daily newsletter. To subscribe (free), visit here.

The winner gets: Most votes advances to the Elite Eight (round of 8), and a shot at the Biofuels Final Four.

The loser: Goes home.

Laurels: Codexis is the 9th ranked company in the 2010-11 50 Hottest Companies in Bioenergy poll. OriginOil is currently #33.

The match-up: It’s algae upstart vs enzymes behemoth.

Codexis took 66 percent of the votes in its first round battle with Propel Fuels, and defeated Rentech 58-42 in round two. The Cinderella of the tournament, OriginOil, upset #6 seed Genencor, winning 56-44 in round one, and then also defeated Sapphire Energy 56-44 in round two.

Codexis is producing enzymes for Shell for low-cost cellulosic biofuels, and producing low-cost renewable chemicals for itself. Codexis is increasingly aimed at sugarcane bagasse as a breakout feedstock available at scale, through the Shell-Cosan “Raizen” joint venture.

OriginOil, an algae-to-fuels technology developer that has recently acquired a hot new customer in MBD Energy, in Australia, for its algal growth and extraction systems.

Deep Dive Data on Codexis and OriginOil

OriginOil’s complete Hot 50 / Transformative Technologies profile is here.

Codexis’ complete Hot 50 / Transformative Technologies profile is here.